EPT.01
third time's the charm, again
by Destructicon
When the dust settled, a familiar figure stood smiling before the cheering crowd of San Jose. It was a difficult victory for the Smiling Assassin, as he had to fight tooth and nail throughout his journey. Each and every opponent presented an unique and very difficult challenge. But in the end 
herO triumphed off the back of his strong style and his incredible adaptability.
The first and (by his own admission) greatest demon that herO needed to exorcise was 
LiquidSnute. Snute had previously worked him over back at IEM Toronto, stopping all of herO's strikes cold with his impervious swarm host turtling style. Initially, it appears as if the Smiling Assassin hadn't learned his lesson. He tried to go toe-to-toe with the Asgardian in two late game macrofests, but was soundly beaten to within an inch of his life.
Down two games, herO realized he would have to fight Snute on a different set of terms. He first prayed to the power of the great Protoss soul and sent forth his best Immortal-Sentry attack to take back a map. He followed it up with perhaps the best game of the series: after regaining his composure, herO picked the Norwegian Zerg apart on Nimbus in an impressive display of late game PvZ harass. At one point Snute had 0 income, having lost all his hatches, and promptly ran out of steam. With the series tied up, herO was now in full control and finished Snute off with a strong multi-pronged attack on Catallena.
CJherO's next opponent was
Jaedong, a very different kind of zerg. Snute was a player who wanted his opponents to hang themselves, but Jaedong was much more willing to bring the heat to Protosses. The 3-1 score doesn't fully do the series justice as it was a lot more scrappy than the previous one. Both players managed to force out significant mistakes from each other; the only exception was the game on Nimbus, were both players brought forth their best late game PvZ macro. Yet even then, herO's harass overwhelmed the Zerg's ability to react. His quick stabs was too strong for Jaedong to deal with, limiting his economy enough that the first real engagement left the EG Zerg unable to remax on corrupters. Without a bank, Jaedong was left helpless to challenge herO's air fleet.
After defeating two zergs back to back herO had to abruptly switch gears to face mYi's latest star,
Rain. Mentally this was an important series for herO, who had lost two big PvP finals in the past and was eliminated in inglorious fashion by Classic at Blizzcon. As is the case with most PvP series, mind games played a crucial role. herO was the first beneficiary as he deduced Rain's proxied stargate -> oracle gambit and deflected the attack, gaining a lead too large for Rain to contest. Not to be outdone, Rain subsequently pulled a fast one via dark templar on Nimbus. Continuing his record of impressive contributions to the matchup, Rain displayed another PvP innovation in his incorporation of high templar into the midgame. Branching off from an old PvT approach, Rain pummeled herO's economy with storm drops and absorbed all attempted counterattacks with fully stocked templar. This new style caught herO completely off guard and cost him the next two games.
With everything on the line, herO fell back upon a safe, methodical style that was unusual to watch. In every game he scouted for proxy gateways in his main: having asserted no more cheese would be coming his way, herO carefully selected the builds for each map. This new modus operandi bore immediate fruit as herO gradually eroded Rain's lead with brilliant fights and well-executed mind games.
His string of successes finally culminated in Game 7, where herO simply outplayed Rain in every way. Foiling Rain's plans at each turn and gaining incremental small leads from that information, the roles were startling reversed: herO looked like the PvP savant and Rain the mediocrity struggling to keep up. By the end, herO's lead was so large that he was able to mount a frontal assault upon Rain's own natural. It looked close for a moment but in the end, herO's micro was just enough to secure him the game, the series and the tournament.
With his victory at San Jose herO had become the first triple IEM Champion. Overall it was a hard year for herO, he had to suffer through a lot of stinging defeats in between his victories. However he didn't let the soul crushing loss of Katowice, or his early exit from Blizzcon get to him, instead he learned from his mistakes and adapted. CJherO's IEM win also echoed another recent trend, that of protoss players fighting back to reclaim some of their glory.
With recent discord in the community, sparked by terran dominance and perceived imbalance, it was a breath of fresh air seeing protosses win again. At the end of the day, PartinG, sOs and herO proved that, there was really no obstacle too hard to overcome if you study, prepare and work hard enough to achieve your dreams!
